Many students come to school facing a serious loss-such as parental divorce, death of a friend or family member, or loss of a parent through imprisonment or death. Techers are on the front lines of helping students deal with loss and grief, but few have any training in identifying vulnerable students and knowing how to respond sensitively. San Antonio discuss the complex emotions accompanying grief in children and gives suggestions and resources to help educators respond, both within the classroom and schoolwide in ways that help kids heal.

Helping Students Grieve

Donna Marie San Antonio

Safe (whole child)

Healthy (whole child)

Supported (whole child)

Student engagement and motivation

Social-emotional learning

School climate and culture

Struggling students

Engagement

Relationships in school matter a great deal to low-income students who are too often invisible and undervalued. San Antonio maintains that teachers must become familiar with their lower-income students' strengths and life situations and must distribute their time and positive attention equally among students if they are to give all students access to a high-quality education. Drawing on interviews she conducted with 12-year-old students from low-income and high-income areas (who attended a common middle school), San Antonio describes approaches for fostering positive relationships among teachers, students, and students' families. She recommends openly discussing the inequalities often present in schools, becoming familiar with students' communities and individual situations, and accommodating students' differing values and learning styles. A sidebar lists resources for teaching about equity issues.

Understanding Students' Strengths and Struggles

Poverty

Achievement gap

Diverse classrooms and schools

Whole Child: Supported

Early adolescence is a time of great turmoil as well as tremendous social, emotional, and cognitive growth. Young people at this age are becoming more aware of social status and of their position in the social hierarchy; at the same time, they are usually moving into larger school environments where they are exposed to more variation among their peers. Thus, it is important that schools provide diverse environments that support the social growth of students in this age group. The author describes her two-year study of 30 economically diverse students who were moving from grade 6 in one-town elementary schools to grade 7 in a multi-town regional middle school. She found that social relationships were of paramount concern to students, and that certain school structures—especially competitive extracurricular activities and ability grouping—tended to heighten social segregation. The article ends with the recommendation that middle schools carefully examine how to balance social development and academic achievement, and the author's assertion that we cannot have one without the other.

Broadening the World of Early Adolescents

Early adolescence is a time of great turmoil as well as tremendous social, emotional, and cognitive growth. Young people at this age are becoming more aware of social status and of their position in the social hierarchy; at the same time, they are usually moving into larger school environments where they are exposed to more variation among their peers. Thus, it is important that schools provide diverse environments that support the social growth of students in this age group. The author describes her two-year study of 30 economically diverse students who were moving from grade 6 in one-town elementary schools to grade 7 in a multi-town regional middle school. She found that social relationships were of paramount concern to students, and that certain school structures—especially competitive extracurricular activities and ability grouping—tended to heighten social segregation. The article ends with the recommendation that middle schools carefully examine how to balance social development and academic achievement, and the author’s assertion that we cannot have one without the other.

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School Culture

Author

Donna Marie San Antonio

About

Primary Topics

Articles by Donna Marie

Helping Students Grieve

Understanding Students' Strengths and Struggles

Broadening the World of Early Adolescents

Broadening the World of Early Adolescents

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